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Related to this, Main Character is running a multi-racial nation, whose members are persecuted by the religious authority of the humans of that world. And human nations--read Kingdoms and Empires--around them dislike the MC's nation because it has resource, its animal people are much better swordsmen, archer, or musketeer then they are, and it is a beacon of democracy compare to the human nations. So MC's nation needs to prepare for war. And they need tactical and strategic intelligence of military, political, and economic for that. However, human nations has rules about letting animal peoples enter and live within their nations, with strictness dependes on how much they discriminate against animal people. Some nations treat animal people the same as human, and some nation won't even allow animal people to set foot in its cities. There are sympathizers with animal people within even the most anti-animal people nation, but willingness to provide intelligence varied. At that time, human nations are still using messager pigeons, couriers, and watchtowers for official long distance messaging and civilians could only hear news from travelling bards and merchants. However, because MC comes from modern world, animal people nation is already using WWI technology, with telegrams and telephones as primary communication methods. How could MC's spies get useful intelligence from enemy government when they can't even physically get close to their halls of power?

Edit: the human nations are still in late 18th/early 19th century technology. Some nations have acknowledged MC's nation and established diplomatic ties, some don't. The animal peoples are visibly humanoid and are about the same size as the average homo sapient. The intelligence difference between a cat people and a cat is the same difference between a human and a chimpanzee and are viewed as such in that world.

Edit 2: the method should also be able to withstand the scrutiny of the counter-espionage effort that is possible for human nations of those technology and psychology era.

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  • $\begingroup$ Do they have any technology - satellites, internet etc.? Are the birds intelligent everywhere, are birds not allowed in certain capitols? Do they have diplomatic ties/strategic agreements with sympathetic human nations? Without more info to base an answer on it's tricky. $\endgroup$
    – Escaped dental patient.
    Commented Dec 31, 2021 at 18:07

3 Answers 3

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Sexpionage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexpionage

pepe le pew

Your animal people are good at what they do, as is acknowledged by all. Some of them are "companion animals" shall we say, and work in human countries as dancers and courtesans in high end bordellos. This is not a new phenomenon in your world and many otherwise very prejudiced countries have strange cutouts for certain types of fetishized and sexualized animal people.

Animal people working these jobs in human countries are not common streetwalkers. Their employers / owners of their contracts understand that they cannot mess with the magic and they do their best to cultivate the "rare and exotic" stereotype.

The patrons of expensive sex companions are wealthy and powerful humans. They are often willing to talk and confide in their companions, seeing no harm in it. Some of these animal people then relay information back home.

Also, the inclusion of sexy animal people always makes for a much more interesting story! That means you, Pepe! We want you back!

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  • $\begingroup$ But human nations are not that modern. A high-end rich-people gathering in the wild (because MC's spies can't get into cities) are going to be constant targets of bandits though, and rich people are not going to want to be seen leaving the city wall often and incurred questions about where they are going. $\endgroup$
    – Faito Dayo
    Commented Jan 1, 2022 at 1:22
  • $\begingroup$ Why would they go into the wild? These are fancy brothels in town I am talking about. You dont need to be very modern to have your city host "the oldest profession". $\endgroup$
    – Willk
    Commented Jan 1, 2022 at 1:44
  • $\begingroup$ But animal people are not allowed to even enter a city--it is a walled city, with guards at entrance and doing patrol inside the town $\endgroup$
    – Faito Dayo
    Commented Jan 1, 2022 at 4:28
  • $\begingroup$ I thought I read somewhere that in Star Trek, Orion diplomacy worked like this. $\endgroup$
    – user64888
    Commented Jan 1, 2022 at 16:13
  • $\begingroup$ @FaitoDayo - yes; guards and patrols. But laws are for the plebians. The authorities look the other way for animal people under the control of rich people. You might find an amazing animal person silversmith kept well out of view of customers. A noblewoman will have a bear person as one of her bodyguards. Her 2 human bodyguards are prejudiced but Bruno is an exception: they are not upset in the least to have him walk with them. The high end bordello has some special geishas. Advice to animal people: do not try to recruit Bruno to be a spy. He is where he is for a reason. $\endgroup$
    – Willk
    Commented Jan 1, 2022 at 17:59
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Money.

The USSR gained the most intelligence not from infiltrating sovietic Nationals in the western block, but by bribing Nationals of the target countries into selling those information. That's how they got top secret data on silent submarines, for example.

The same happened in the past: Muslims paid Christians and vice versa to get intelligence from the other side, just to name an example.

Same can happen in your case. You will find someone disgruntled or greedy enough to sell their country.

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  • $\begingroup$ Actually, both America and Russia gathered most of their intelligence about the other's secrets from ideologically motivated sources. Sure, they also had paid sources. See for example, Klaus Fuchs (whom Hans Bethe called the only physicist who had truly changed history), Melita Norwood, the famous Cambridge Five, Anatoliy Golitsyn, Vasili Mitrokhin etc. $\endgroup$
    – AlexP
    Commented Dec 31, 2021 at 19:07
  • $\begingroup$ But how do you get close to these people if MC's agents can't even enter the city? You have to talk to them in order to entice them to sell intel, right? $\endgroup$
    – Faito Dayo
    Commented Dec 31, 2021 at 19:45
  • $\begingroup$ The KGB and CIA both relied on all of the MICE: Money, Ideology, Coercion and Ego. Money is the most obvious but the least reliable. $\endgroup$
    – StephenS
    Commented Dec 31, 2021 at 22:14
  • $\begingroup$ but like i said, how to contact these people if the agents can't get into the city? $\endgroup$
    – Faito Dayo
    Commented Jan 1, 2022 at 1:23
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Main Character is running a multi-racial nation

Send in your humans as spies. You are trying to integrate humans into your cities, right?

There are sympathizers with animal people within even the most anti-animal people nation, but willingness to provide intelligence varied.

Recruit these people as spies. They will come to you.

it is a beacon of democracy compare to the human nations.

Recruit pro democracy rebels as spies. They will come to you. If your troops are superior then they may even ask you to invade their country.

At that time, human nations are still using messager pigeons, couriers, and watchtowers for official long distance messaging

Intercept these communications.

civilians could only hear news from travelling bards and merchants.

Bards and merchants also get audiences with high ranking officials and spend lots of time outside of cities. Intercept them and make them spies when they travel outside of cities.

its animal people are much better swordsmen, archer, or musketeer then they are

Become mercenaries and have your troops become the backbone of the enemies armies. It seems dumb but smarter empires have fallen for it. Eventually you won’t even need to gain access to military secrets that they hand to you since attacking your nation means that half of their army, that is, your army, will desert.

Just wait, anyone not prejudiced will seek out your military services in secret. The will then want to make it easier to use your services, by making legislation that allows them to use your services. If that is impossible, you can offer to lower the amount you charge in exchange for espionage.

The animal peoples are visibly humanoid and are about the same size as the average homo sapient. The intelligence difference between a cat people and a cat is the same difference between a human and a chimpanzee and are viewed as such in that world.

Based on this I actually don’t see any indication that people can’t just hide that they are animal people with make up or basic disguises. Sure you might have a tail, but unless you are asking every woman in your country to lift up their skirts for guards on command, you can just hide that under a dress. Therefore getting spies into high rank building is feasible so long as no one is doing a strip search, and you can easily sneak into cities to contact spies.

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